Telling Stories.

As I write this email, I am at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health. I am assisting a self-development program. During one of the staff meetings, I was celebrating the fact that I am now a best selling author for my chapter in “Faces of Grief” (see below to order). In the book I tell the story of my 25+ year grief journey. The inspiration for being in the book was to bring sibling loss into the grief conversation. So often, our loss gets disenfranchised.

As the program went on, the staff got curious and started asking questions about Lauren. It gave me the opportunity to talk about her without getting the pity eye rolls (you know what I am talking about). It was so wonderful to talk about her. I was able to tell her stories. Both the good, the bad and the ugly. The group of people on staff were generally curious to hear all about her.

Finding a group of people that will listen to the stories is so important. I spend so much time talking about her death, that I need to make the time to talk about her life. When I talk about how she lived, it brings her presence into the present moment and makes me feel like I am closer to her. The way I look at it, the more I talk about her, the more present she is in my life. The more present she is in my life, the less I miss her because she still exists, just in a different form.

I have heard it said that people die twice. Once when their physical body dies, and, twice when people stop mentioning their names. Telling their story keeps their names present in other peoples’ thoughts. Thus, keeping their memory alive.

Tell their story.

Blessings,

Jason